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Estimates of the quantity of food produced in Papua New Guinea (PNG) are important for planning and research. Information contained in the Mapping Agricultural Systems of PNG database of the proportion of land devoted to various food crops allows new estimates to be made. To calculate annual production for each staple crop, estimates of the proportion of garden area devoted to each crop for each agricultural system were combined with census data on the rural population in 2000 (4.3 million rural villagers), mean garden area planted per person per year and mean crop yield for that environment. These data allow estimates to be made for banana, cassava, coconut, potato, Queensland arrowroot, rice, sago, sweet potato, and various taro and yam species. Total annual staple crop production is estimated as 4.5 million tonnes (1050 kg/person/year), with an energy value of 4.3 × 1012 kilocalories (2770 kcal/person/day). It would require an additional 1.2 million tonnes per year of imported rice to replace the energy value of these staple foods, with a retail value of K2850 million.

"We don’t want to leave this place. We don’t want to leave, it’s our land, our God given land, it is our culture, we can’t leave. People won’t leave until the very last minute.” With these dramatic words, Paani Laupepa, the former assistant secretary at Tuvalu's Ministry of Natural Resources, Energy and Environment, expressed the feelings of many Tuvaluans when it comes to the worst-case scenario of climate change and its effects on small island nations. The scenarios and warnings of international scientist on climate change and its inevitable consequences must be like a constant Damocles Sword for the inhabitants of Tuvalu. For the 21st century, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) states that there will be a warming of global temperatures and a rise of the sea level by up to almost one meter.

To’atuga Reef is located between 6.5-7.4 km (3.5-4.0 nautical miles) north or seaward of Apia Harbour (middle) on the north coast of Upolo Island, Samoa. It is an elongate ridge of reef extending in a NW–SE axis, with a broad reef top which ranges between 15-22m descending on a slope of 300 450 with vertical sections to a sand and rubble bottom at 35-40m. The reef top is characterised by a low topographic relief with the undulating contours of small ridges and depressions. This report provides a baseline description of the major habitat types and dominant fauna present on the reef. A basic inventory and description of the To’atuga marine environment is undertaken. Transects were used to detail the occurrence primarily of fish, coral, algae, mobile invertebrates and physical substrate types. Preliminary species inventories were compiled for hard coral and fish, with records of other benthos. General features of the habitat such as the surge environment, current, depth, bathymetric profile, community type and dynamics are described. Bathymetric assessment was aided by the profiling of the reef by South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission (SOPAC) which provided a framework for site position and general reef assessment. Impacts of storms, coral bleaching, disease and the human impacts of recreational diving, fishing and anchoring are discussed and management recommendations made.

This paper provides an overview of the role of the Pacific Islands Forum in ocean governance. The paper gives a short summary of the Pacific Islands Forum, and highlights its initiatives and directions that have underpinned oceans development in the region over the past thirty years.

The presentation of the Pacific Islands Regional Ocean Policy at the 2002World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg marked the culmination of yet another milestone achievement in regional cooperation in the Pacific Islands. The formulation of the regional policy began with a request from the 1999 Forum Leaders that a regional ocean policy be produced. This Policy is to be the basis for the harmonisation of national and regional actions in relation to oceanic and coastal resources in the Pacific Islands. The Policy will also offer the platform for the formulation of a Pacific Islands Regional Ocean Strategic Action Plan that will prescribe the sustainable use of the Ocean and its resources. The countries were urged to become parties to international treaties and conventions such as the Law of the Sea Convention.